return my penis to its

hiding place,

wash my foolish

hands,

walk from the

bathroom to this

room.

she has followed

me.

outside the night is

past midnight.

inside, there is no

time.

I uncap the beer

bottle,

swallow down

Rome,

Carthage,

yesterday and

the churning of

now.

she watches me

and waits.

I scratch my neck

as the entire

earth

comes in through

the window.

it has a form.

the form is a

body of dark

air.

the lady waits

for my love

as I notice the

hairs on my

arms,

the veins on

my hands.

I light a cigar,

inhale, then

exhale a cloud

of smoke.

I lift the beer

bottle

as somewhere

in the night

a dog barks

rapidly,

five times,

then

stops.

the barometer

when I was very young

I heard it from

my parents after they

discovered a few

early stories

hidden in my room:

“THIS IS UGLY!

THIS IS SHAMEFUL!”

I was finally

evicted from their

home

(which was

my first piece of good

luck).

then

after decades of

having my work

rejected

I had small bits

published

here and there

only to find many

critics totally

outraged

by my

efforts.

well, my parents

were dead,

they took the place

of my

dead parents.

I accepted the

justice of

this.

then I

married and

now I hear

my mother-in-law

as she exclaims to

my wife:

“WHY DOES HE HAVE

TO WRITE THAT

WAY?

WHY DOES HE

DO IT?”

well, you know,

those voices

past and present are

always going to be

there.

or hopefully

they always will

be.

when they stop

I will know

that I have lost

my spirit,

I will know

I have lost

touch with the

direct line

to the mad

and

laughing

gods.

I will see my

photo on the

cover of

TIME

and I will be

taught in high

school English

along with

Hawthorne and

Whittier.

as long as the

mother-in-law

and many others

protest

I will know that

I am on the

trail of

a living and

lively

thing.

not that I write

in order to

create great and

ennobling

works

but if they

become so

and finally

silence

the grating

bellows of

idiots,

then let that

be

that.

fools sometimes create

genius by their

persistence

and their

puking empty

unjustified

horror,

unmitigated.

the rivers

the rivers of hell are mine, they aren’t yours,

they’re mine, flowing hot and dirty and

endless,

they’re mine, all mine,

special,

for me,

nobody else,

they’re mine

rushing me along,

night and day,

week after week, month after month,

year after year,

they’re mine,

you hear me?

I no longer try to climb out,

I go with the rivers,

I talk to the rivers,

I tell them things

like,

“I know you.

we’ve been together a long

time.

I expect nothing

else.”

we rush toward death

and neither of us

gives a damn about

death,

we’ve got our own game

going.